Story

• How do stories
work?
• What makes a story
compelling?

On the Waterfront
 Story
• Mimesis (Showing)
– Live theatre
• Diegesis (Telling)
– Literary - told by narrator
who may or may not be
reliable
• Cinema combines the
two for a wider range of
storytelling techniques
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• Narratology - how
stories work
– Structures
– Strategies
– Genres and their
symbolism

The Adventures of Robin Hood

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All stories are communication from a sender to a receiver
but in film, who is the sender?

The Director?
The Writer(s)?
The Producers?
The Stars?
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• Star

Hamlet & Lethal Weapon 2

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• Title

Emma & Clueless

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• Director

Jurassic Park, Schindler’s

List & E.T.
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• Knowledge of
history

Unforgiven & The Searchers

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Narrative
Realistic vs. Classical vs. Formalist

Portray the world Storyteller is overly

without distortion manipulative. Time
but It is also a and events are
style. Plot is Guiding hand that restructured to suit.
looser and less shapes the story. Subjective point
defined. The boring bits are of view.
edited out.
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• Strategies
– Realistic Narratives
• “True to Life”
• No distortion
• Conflict is gradually
exposed
• Avoidance of
exaggeration
• Avoidance of
romanticizing cause &
motivation
• Plain, straightforward
presentation Requiem for A Dream
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– Formalist Narrative
• Time is scrambled
• Theme is emphasized
• Interludes of style
• Personality and views
of author are imposed
on subject matter

8 &1/2 & Eternal Sunshine of

the Spotless Mind
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• Classical Paradigm
– Dominant narrative
structure in American Film
– Protagonist - initiates action
– Antagonist - resists action
– Dramatic question -
– How does the protagonist
get what he/she wants
– Conflict/opposition
– Patterns of action - cause &
The Searchers
effect until climax and
resolution
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• Dramatic unity
• Plausible motivations
• Coherence
• All equal a smooth flow of
action
• Deadlines help move the
action
• Often Classical Narrative is a
journey, chase or search
• Protagonist is goal-oriented -
passive characters are not
deemed as interesting
The Searchers
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• Screenplay Structure
– Three Acts
– Act I - Set up
– First quarter of the movie
– Premise defined
– Obstacles laid out

The Searchers
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• Screenplay Structure
– Three Acts
– Act II - Confrontation
– First quarter of the movie
– Protagonist fights obstacles
– Reversal of fortune in middle

The Searchers
 Story
• Screenplay Structure
– Three Acts
– Act III - Resolution
– What happens as a result
of the climax

The Searchers
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• Chekhov’s Gun
– If you see a gun on
the wall in Act I, it
better go off in Act III

Anton Chekhov, 1860-1904

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• Types of Genres
– Way to organize the
story conveniently
– Conventions
understood by
audience
– Archetypal story
pattern
– Conventions and
artistic contributions
Johnny Guitar
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• Western
• Musical
• Melodrama
• Crime/Gangster
• Thriller
• Horror
• Sci-Fi
• Action
• War
• Fantasy
• Comedy
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• Repeated elements
• Familiar elements

Eyes Without a Face

H2O
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• Cycles of Genre
– Primitive

The Great Train Robbery

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• Cycles of Genre
– Classical

Stagecoach
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• Cycles of Genre
– Revisionist

Unforgiven
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• Cycles of Genre
– Parodic

Blazing Saddles
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• John Ford
• Master of the Western
although these were not
considered serious films
at the time
• More directing Oscars
than anyone - 4 plus 2
for WWII films for the
Navy where he was a
Rear Admiral - he was at
Omaha Beach on D-Day
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• Partnered often with
John Wayne (24 films)
who he often mocked
as a “big idiot” and
made him cry
• Though progressive
politically, he was often
identified with the
conservative politics of
John Wayne & Jimmy
Stewart
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• Began as an actor - he was
one of the riding Klansmen
in Birth of a Nation
• Soon was directing
• Hit his stride in the 1930’s
with The Informer
• Major player in 1939 - one
one the greatest years for
Hollywood ever with
Stagecoach, Young Mr.
Lincoln & Drums Along the
Mohawk
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• Simple, direct style
• Director & writer John Milius
describes John Ford's style in
terms of the Japanese idea of
"conservation of line", saying
Ford can do with a couple of
"brush strokes" what it takes
others six or eight to do
• Ford talked about what he
called "invisible technique", to
make an audience forget they
were watching a movie The Searchers, 1956
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• Location shooting - Shot many films
in Monument Valley, Utah no matter
where they were set
• The long shot
• Cutting “in camera”
• Cited as a major influence by
directors such as:
– Akira Kurosawa, Martin Scorsese,
Steven Spielberg, George Lucas,
Sam Peckinpah, Peter Bogdanovich,
Sergio Leone, Clint Eastwood, Wim
Wenders, David Lean, Orson
Welles, Ingmar Bergman, Quentin
Tarantino, François Truffaut, and
Jean-Luc Godard
John Ford Point
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• Responsible for some
of the most enduring
imagery in American
film
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The Informer They Were Expendable

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon Fort Apache

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Cheyenne Autumn

The Man Whop Shot

Liberty Valance

The Searchers

The Quiet Man

Mister Roberts
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• The Searchers
– 1956
– Dir. John Ford
– John Wayne, Jeffrey
Hunter & Natalie Wood
– Voted #12 film of all time
by the American Film
Institute
– Ford’s first attempt to
confront the stereotypes
and racial attitudes he
had helped create
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The Indian is very close to my heart... [they
are] wonderful people... they actually still
live as they always have, simply and close
to the land. They’re not greatly different
than they were, particularly not at heart.

There’s some merit to the charge that the

Indian hasn’t been portrayed accurately or
fairly in the Western, but again, this charge
has been a broad generalization and often
unfair. The Indian didn’t welcome the white
man... and he wasn’t diplomatic... If he has
been treated unfairly by whites in films,
that, unfortunately, was often the case in
real life. There was much racial prejudice
in the West.

John Ford